A Warning

Also from "Kinetoscope of Time"

I also was fascinated with this reading because it completely diverted from other readings that focused on man's attempt to bypass time to see the future and past. Here the man simply wanted to wait for the experience to come to him. He was not obsessed with finding out his future. He had a clear vision of what his past was and would simply wait for his future to come to him in natural time. In a way one can say that being obsessed with bypassing time can lead to one's demise. In "The Time Machine", the time traveler is obsessed with jumping over the linear path of one's time into the future. Once there, the time traveler becomes involved in a plot that is way over his head and out of his own control. Its a miracle that the Time Traveler was even able to survive his incredible trip and make it back in two pieces. The man from the Kinetoscope of Time is weary of seeing the future because he knows that precognitions of his future could severely affect him in the long run. The Kinetoscope of Time can almost be seen as a warning against obsessing over time and one's future. The author is making the statement that if one sits back and lets things happen naturally, then things will eventually turn out right. Jump ahead and your life will be turned utterly upside down. This was an interesting reading and one of the only ones in the course that appeared to downplay the role of media in bypassing linear time fragments.

Slaves to the Music

Throughout the acts that took place during the Berkeley Dance Project today there was one thing that jumped out at me: the choreography. The choreography was incredible because the dancers not only danced well but they also performed many other actions that needed to be done to a strict time schedule. A good example of this was when one of the dancers from "The Reception" had a conversation with another dancer who was not actually present there but on the television. I was amazed at how much it looked like a conversation between two people in the same room. There were also many other actions through this particular act that were done to a strict time schedule such as the part when the dancers went behind screens and hid while a video of them dancing was played. Since there were so many different actions within the acts that the dancers needed to memorize, I began to wonder how they did it with such accuracy and rhythm. I believe that they were doing their actions in accordance with the music that was playing in the background. Each part of the songs defined their actions and it was almost as if they were slaves to the music. This reminded me of the clip from "Metropolis" when the workers are slaves to the machine and must work to a perfect time schedule in order for the factory to function. Throughout the Berkeley Dance Project, this idea was extremely evident. If the dancers didn't perform a certain action with the music playing, then that single mistake would cause a waterfall effect and the whole act would become messed up. The dancers were "slaves" to the music of each act.
On a whole the Berkeley Dance Project was interesting but I had a tough time interpreting the actions of the dancers and had trouble finding meaning in each of the acts. However, I was really impressed by the choreography and that was the one thing that jumped out at me while I was watching it.

Lack of Looping and its Effect on our Everyday Lives

In Lev Manovich's text, "The New Temporality: The Loop as a Narrative Engine,
Manovich states that our society's media development is largely characterized by "loops". These loops define how certain things like video games develop their programming. However, Manovich points out that our society is moving farther and farther away from this looping and repetitive aspect to gaming. Variety and lack of repetition are now the keys to success in the gaming world. Cutting edge graphics and virtual reality settings allow the gamer to appear to actually be in the game defining his or her own future. We know longer get pleasure from simple repetitions of code within video game programing and we now prefer more complex code within the programing to make the game more "real".
In making the game more "real", Manovich makes the argument that we are striving towards individualism. I would have to say that I agree with Manovich's statement. Based on my own personal experience, video gamers these days need the cutting edge graphics and lack of looping to make the game interesting. We are no longer content with the simple games like Mario or Sonic the Hedgehog from the early 90's. Now games like Halo and virtual reality sports games like FIFA Soccer are letting kids feel like they are in the game. People can act in their own way within the gaming system and are no longer bound to the same simple codes of the game. An argument can be made as to whether or no this movement towards individualism is transcending to our lives everyday. Are our actions within video games defining the way we act in life? I believe in some cases this is true. The growth of video games has grown enough to fact that some kids spend so much time within the gaming world that they dont know how to act in real life so they act like they do in video games in an individualistic way. A question for the future is whether or not the lack of looping within every kind of media will have a serious effect on the social characteristics of civilization.

Innovation and Efforts of Nauman

After taking the trip the Berkeley Art Museum to observe the work of Bruce Nauman, I came out with a very puzzled view at his art work. It was very hard for a normal person not exposed to much art to have a sense of connection to the work of Nauman. Throughout most of the exhibit I was puzzled most of the time and failed to understand the meaning behind each art piece. Upon further thought I decided that I needed to appreciate the innovation and efforts of Nauman in his works rather than try to identify with each individual piece.
The innovation of Nauman is the use of his own human body throughout most of his art work. Most of the work in the exhibit was sculptures or imprints of his own body rather than someone elses. Most artists don't use their own body to do art because of the amount of effort it takes to complete the work. Two great example of this innovation and effort were the videos of Nauman tilting back and forth into a corner of a wall and the video of Nauman using his body to make different sculptures of the human form. The amount of effort in these videos is unbelievable. Its hard to imagine moving in out of a corner for 60 minutes without break or any kind of reprieve. The same goes for the effort into changing the form of your body almost every minute for an hour. These videos were something that I've never experienced in art so I had to appreciate the innovation and originality of his work.